Name: London Design Festival
Start: 2024-09-14T00:00:00+00:00
End: 2024-09-22T23:59:59+00:00

The origin of London Design Festival

In 2003, Sir John Sorrell CBE and Ben Evans CBE founded the London Design Festival. Building on London’s existing design activities, their idea was to create an annual event that would promote the city’s creativity by engaging British design practitioners and thinkers, to provide a grand celebration of design.

An extraordinary audience in London

In 2019, the Festival welcomed a record 600,000 visitors from over 75 countries. Now in its 22nd year, the London Design Festival celebrates its key role in the design industry’s growth. It also strengthens London’s position as a global destination for business, culture and tourism. It contributes to the UK’s reputation as a center of creative power. As one of the world’s leading design events, the Festival continues to be a key moment in the cultural calendar.

Discover Clerkenwell Design Week in London

Bamboo Ring by Kengo Kuma, V&A Museum, London Design Festival 2019

The London Design Festival 2024

For 2024, 14-22 September, the London Design Festival offers a wide variety of events as always. “Visit Greater Palm Springs” and Nina Tolstrup bring the inimitable mid-century Barbie brand to the Aldwych Strand. Beverage giant Johnnie Walker and art collective Marshmallow Laser Feast delve into the innovative world of glassmaking at the Old Selfridges Hotel, while at Somerset House, Dutch solar designer Marjan van Aubel (with support from Bloomberg Philanthropies) gives new meaning to the phrase “a place in the sun.”

Discover Surface Design Show in London

Pavilions of Wonder by Nina Tolstrup. Photo Ed Reeve, courtesy of London Design Festival

In Greenwich, Melek Zeynep Bulut explores duality and interaction in a suspended installation. AHEC, Diez Office, and OMC°C focus on sustainable structures and biodiversity at Chelsea College of Arts. Finally, at Fortnum & Mason, designer Jaime Hayon reinterprets the storefronts and atrium of the historic store to striking effect.

Read more about the Design Week Guide

‘Duo’ installation by Melek Zeynep, in the Old Royal Naval College in Greenwich, London Design Festival 2024

These major projects complement a myriad of smaller Spotlight events scattered throughout the city’s Design Districts (11 this year).

In addition, the 2024 Medal winners -titans from the worlds of cosmetics, fashion, humanitarian engineering, and holistic biotechnology- include emerging and (very) established names, celebrating the creative spirit for a range of holistic, benevolent and aesthetic purposes.

As always, the Global Design Forum raises big questions and compels even bigger answers. This year, topics of the discussions at the V&A Museum include designing for the human experience, building healthier cities, and embracing resilience and repair within our industries.

As with 2023, the London Design Festival partnered with Bloomberg Connects’ mobile guide to make the Festival easier to navigate- an essential tool when there is so much to discover.

Why visit

The London Design Festival is a wide-ranging project, offering some specialized sector exhibitions and area-wide projects. The projects, scattered throughout the city, also involve the general public, who are not very design savvy. It’s a chance to visit London, and to see areas you might not usually go to. Or, at any rate, revisit buildings or areas you already know in a different guise. For the specialist audience of interior designers, architects, and designers, the Festival is a chance to visit showrooms after hours, see new product innovations, and meet the renowned designers participating. The complete Guide is on the London Design Festival website.

All images are courtesy of London Design Festival